Needham High student hacks computers, posts student info on Facebook

Tuesday

A Needham High School junior used part of a teacher’s password to hack into the school’s computer system, accessing the class schedule of every incoming student and posting them on Facebook.

A Needham High School junior used part of a teacher’s password to hack into the school’s computer system, accessing the class schedule of every incoming student and posting them on Facebook.

“Essentially what this student did was he went to a file cabinet, took the files out of the school and photocopied them; he just did it virtually,” said Superintendent Dan Gutekanst.

The breach of the school’s computer system was brought to Gutekanst’s attention about two weeks ago. Gutekanst and Needham High School Principal Paul Richards sent an e-mail to parents Aug. 25 explaining the situation.

Richards declined to make any additional comment.

The e-mail said the 17-year-old high school junior, who is not being identified, posted on his Facebook account an Excel file that contained each high school student's schedule and identification number for the upcoming school year, along with each teacher's class roster. The e-mail said the student admitted to learning part of a teacher's password and then developing a program to hack into PowerSchool, the program used by Needham Schools to manage student information, to retrieve student data. None of the data was altered.

“We ask that you speak with your children and ask them not to pass along the file (which is still happening), but to instead delete the email,” the administrators’ e-mail said. “If they have already downloaded the file, please ask them to delete it from the computer, for the information is stolen property.”

Gutekanst said he doesn’t know how the student got hold of the teacher’s password. He noted the incident does not suggest any problems with the PowerSchool program.

“We do believe this is a safe and secure system,” Gutekanst said. “We’re certainly going to look at ways we can work with teachers to make sure the system is safe and secure. …This is about a student who broke into our school house and took information that didn’t belong to him.”

The schools plan to insist the student compensate them for the energy, time and expense of on correcting the issues caused by the student’s breach of the system.

“The student caused a significant problem,” Gutekanst said. “We have to reevaluate our procedures and work on changing the teachers’ passwords.”

Needham Police are also looking into the matter. Gutekanst said the student has been cooperative, and that he doesn’t believe any other students were involved.

“There’s no question there will be some significant discipline from the school’s end,” Gutekanst said, noting he doesn’t believe the student was trying to be malicious. “The student’s use of technology is in question and a suspension is being looked at as a possibility.”

As for the student identification numbers, Gutekanst is unsure if it will be necessary to assign new numbers to incoming students, noting the numbers are randomly assigned and are simply considered “management tools.”

Gutekanst first learned about the breach about two weeks ago, when a parent called him at his home and told him about it. Gutekanst then had his daughter “friend” the student on Facebook so that he could access the file as it was posted on the networking Web site.